


come in from the cold

by cupcakeb



Series: lockdown love [2]
Category: Elite (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Childhood Sweethearts, F/M, Sickfic, again - is there a covid tag?, this is basically a bottle episode in fic form
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-19
Updated: 2020-11-19
Packaged: 2021-03-09 19:28:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,425
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27631408
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cupcakeb/pseuds/cupcakeb
Summary: Carla didn't think her body knew how to get sick, honestly. Stuck isolating in her apartment in Madrid, she calls the only person in town who might still like her enough to help her out.
Relationships: Carla Rosón Carleruega/Guzmán Nunier Osuna
Series: lockdown love [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2017289
Comments: 13
Kudos: 38





	come in from the cold

There’s a special place in hell for the person who coughed in her direction or breathed her way and made this happen. She’s had an odd, itchy feeling in her throat for the past two days, and then this pounding headache set in this morning and now it’s just after midnight and she can feel her forehead burning up while she’s struggling to fall asleep. 

It’s May, and she’s heard about these exact symptoms on the news one too many times to just be naive about what this is. Carla doesn’t tend to get sick, but it’s apparent her body makes exceptions for viruses with a certain je nais se quois flair. 

She finally manages to fall asleep, exhaustion taking over, and when she wakes up in the morning she feels worse. Her entire body feels hot, and her joints are kind of achy when she tries to get out of bed, and any chance of this not being what she thinks it is shot to hell when she pours herself a glass of orange juice and realizes she can’t fucking taste anything. Fucking amazing. 

For now, she’s feeling well enough to stay levelheaded. The internet tells her there’s a hotline she can call to book a test, and she spends about an hour on hold while she and the rest of Madrid seemingly play a game of twiddling their thumbs as they wait to be redirected to an admin person. When she finally gets to speak to a human, she’s a little over this already. 

She feels groggy and frustrated, and when the woman on the other end of the line nicely asks her to explain her symptoms in detail, she loses it. “Are you suggesting I’m lying? Why would I go through all this trouble if I was faking it?” 

The (admittedly very nice) lady apologizes, and Carla takes a deep breath, then goes through her symptoms of the past days and lets her know she’d be happy to come in for a test literally whenever. 

There’s a testing center that’s been set up in a university auditorium within walking distance from her apartment downtown, and they somehow have capacity to fit her in for a test an hour from now, which feels pretty lucky. It’s only when they’re about to hang up that she realizes she has no idea how to act out in the world now that she might be a carrier of this disease. 

She tunes out most of the rest of the call, just hears, “…wear a mask for the entirety of your time outside, do not take public transport, and definitely do not enter any stores.” 

Well, gee, she wasn’t planning on going on a shopping spree. Though, come to think of it... if she does have Covid, she might want to start thinking about ways to ensure she won’t starve to death while isolating in her apartment. Chances are UberEats isn’t gonna bring her meds and healthy snacks. 

The test itself is absolutely disgusting. The tonsil swab is bad, and makes her gag, but the nose swab is what nearly makes her yell out in pain. It feels like somebody took a screwdriver and decided to stick it so far up her nose, they might as well be tickling her brain. 

For the next twenty-four hours until the test result comes back she stays in bed, alternates between sleeping, feeling utterly miserable and barely awake enough to function, and at least drinking a little bit of water to avoid complete dehydration. She gets the text with the result at nine the next morning and of course the test came back positive. 

If she’s being honest, she didn’t really need a test to tell her. She knew. 

She definitely needs to come up with a plan to keep herself fed and hydrated. For now, though, she’ll just take another nap and hope all of this will be over soon. 

===  


When she decided to leave London and sit this whole thing out in Madrid in late March, she figured it would be a matter of a couple of weeks, at most. All of her classes had been moved online at that point, and the work she does for the wineries is always remote anyway, so none of this virus nonsense was stopping her from getting things done. It might even be good for business, as Valerio had so cleverly joked because if people are stuck at home they’ll definitely be drinking more wine.  
  
Now it’s been six weeks, and while she fully acknowledges that things could be worse, things definitely weren’t great, even before she got sick. Lockdown is depressing in a way Carla hadn’t quite been able to anticipate. She’s got a roof over her head and no job to worry about losing due to all this talk of economic uncertainty but… But it’d be nice to be able to leave the house sometimes. She’s typically out and about all the time, never home long enough to get tired of downtime, and being confined to these four walls has been incredibly dull. God, that feels selfish to think while there are people actually dying at the hands of Covid, but she’s going a little crazy without any sort of social interaction.  
  
She is no longer on speaking terms with her parents and has made the two-bedroom apartment she and Polo were gifted in high school her home base. She basically has no friends in the city, other than Valerio, who works with her so he hardly counts as a friend at this point; he has to put up with her. 

Not having friends in the city isn’t even really an issue, since she’s not allowed to see people anyway. Lu is locked down in New York, so they FaceTime sometimes, and now that everyone’s stuck at home, their old Las Encinas WhatsApp group chat from two years ago is somewhat active again, but that’s kind of it. 

Guzmán isn’t exactly her friend anymore. They were close as kids, then not-so-close once puberty hit, and the death of Marina was sort of the final nail in the coffin — they haven’t really been able to stitch up the friendship after that. Neither of them ever really tried. 

It’s kind of embarrassing that he’s the person she ends up calling when she runs out of grocery delivery services to google. She could’ve called Valerio, but he doesn’t seem like someone who will ever really grasp the concept of social distancing, and she’s pretty sure if he came over to bring her food, he’d just end up catching Covid.  
  
So she calls Guzmán. He picks up on the third ring.

“Carla?” He sounds genuinely surprised, and she’s instantly a little pissed about it. Can’t she call an old friend for a chat? Is that so weird? God, this headache is really ruining any patience she had left for people. 

It probably is a little weird, though. Especially because they hooked up at a party in February when she was in town for a few days to meet with potential investors. It was good, too, but it was an impulsive thing to do, and it’s making this call that’s already difficult to make a little harder still. They haven’t talked about it, because they haven’t talked at all since that night, so maybe he’s allowed to be a little standoffish on the phone with her.  
  
“I need your help,” she says, then rolls her eyes at how needy that came out sounding. Relying on others isn’t her forte, and she isn’t gonna die if he can’t drop off a bag of basic food for her, but still. “If I send you a list, can you drop off some stuff at my place?”  
  
There’s a moment of silence and then, “Wait, you’re in Madrid?”  
  
Patient. She has to be _patient_ with him, even when he’s asking really obvious questions. He’s never been the sharpest tool in the shed.  
  
She doesn’t know how to tell him this next part, because Guzmán is a worrier, so if he finds out she’s actually sick, he’ll be at her door in seconds, trying to offer his help. It doesn’t matter that they barely talk — he’ll definitely instantly go all doting, supportive friend on her.  
  
Deciding to ignore his question, she says, “My test came back positive and I just need you to get me a few things because I’m not legally allowed to leave my apartment.”  
  
She’s not gonna mention her fever or the other mild symptoms she’s dealing with for now. He doesn’t need to know about those.  
  
“Your test? You— oh.” Yeah, still not too quick on the uptake, is he? His confusion is enough to make her smile a little. “Of course, yeah. What do you need?” 

She rattles off a list, then tells him she’ll text him everything and thanks him in advance. A quick goodbye later, she’s hung up and feels a little out of breath from having to speak at all. It’s embarrassing to admit, but making this short call has left her feeling exhausted. Being at the mercy of her body like this is really pissing her off.  
  
She chugs a glass of water, takes two ibuprofen, and allows herself to drift off again, slipping under the little throw blanket she keeps on the couch.  
  
===  
  
A loud knocking sound wakes her up, and when she blinks open an eye, she realizes the sun is about to set outside. God, how long did she sleep for? She hears a male voice yelling her name, instantly recognizes it, and groans. Why is he here now? Who let him into the building? It’s just after 9 o’clock at night — he could’ve just come by tomorrow.  
  
She was gonna shower before he got here, too. Nothing about the ratty old shirt she’s wearing and the pair of loose sweatpants hanging off her hips screams presentable. She runs a hand through her hair on her way to the door and sighs when she comes to stand on the other side of it, knocking right back at him.  
  
“Step back,” she instructs because he obviously shouldn’t be in close contact with her.  
  
She hears him laugh. “What, you don’t want me to see you like this?”  
  
Are they seriously gonna pretend that’s why? She’s pretty sure he’s joking but she’s also pretty sure she’ll end up embarrassing herself by passing out from exhaustion if she has to stand here for longer than strictly necessary. Her fever tends to spike at night, and she can kind of feel herself getting dizzy just from standing upright.   
  
Rolling her eyes, she says, “No, I don’t want you to catch an aggressive virus and infect everyone you know.”  
  
“Alright, alright,” she hears him set down what sounds like a bag of groceries, then hears his steps recede in the hallway. “Open the door.”  
  
She turns the key, pulls open the door, and kind of has to smile when she sees Guzmán standing at the far end of the hallway, a mask on his face. She can tell he’s grinning from the way his eyes are all crinkly.  
  
“Jesus, you look fucking terrible,” is the first thing out of his mouth, and she’s already rethinking this whole keeping her distance thing. Maybe he deserves Covid. He crosses his arms in front of his chest, and she isn’t quite sure how her brain is able to take note of the way it makes his biceps pop, but it does. He looks great, and she apparently looks _fucking terrible_ , so that’s amazing. “Are you doing okay?”  
  
This is definitely the worst possible moment for her to have a coughing fit, but there’s this insistent itch in the back of her throat all of a sudden which is making it impossible for her to speak. She takes a few steps back — safety first — and barely manages to turn around before she feels herself starting to cough, the force of it vibrating in her lungs as though she might spit them out any moment. This has to be the worst cough she’s ever had.  
  
It takes her several moments to compose herself, and when she finally turns back around Guzmán has moved a little closer. He’s kind of just staring at her.  
  
“Stay away from me,” she manages, her voice rough from all the coughing then wipes at her eyes with the back of her hand. “Seriously.”  
  
“They didn’t have pistachio,” he says, already taking a step back again. She gives him a quizzical look — what is he talking about, exactly? “The ice cream you wanted. I went with raspberry sorbet because I remembered you used to like that almost as much.”  
  
He’s being nice to her, and he did this for her without even really questioning why she called him instead of any of the other people she knows in town, so she should be grateful and thank him and make him leave. Instead, she finds herself chuckling a little as she rolls her eyes. “Not like I can taste anything anyway.”  


Guzman’s tapping his foot like he’s nervous or worried, and she feels this super irrational need to go over there and hug him. Covid fucking sucks.  
  
“You’d tell me if you were doing badly right?” She shrugs and avoids eye contact, because she knows she wouldn’t and she knows he probably knows it, too. There’s no point in pretending. He’s laughing in her direction, the sound of it muffled by the mask he’s wearing. “Why did I even ask…”  
  
She grabs the bag of groceries and sets it down inside, then turns to look at him and smiles. “Thanks a lot,” she says. “At least the cause of my death won’t be starvation now.”  
  
He shakes his head. “Nah, your cause of death will be telling the doctors you’re totally fine even as they’re hooking you up to a ventilator while your blood oxygen levels are dropping rapidly.” 

Wow, okay, that’s a bleak picture to paint. If she could, she’d definitely at least playfully punch him in the shoulder right now. She really doesn’t need more terrifying scenarios to picture. “Hey!”  
  
He runs a hand through his hair and laughs a little, then says, “Sorry, I’ve been watching too much horrifying pandemic coverage on TV.”  
  
She snorts out a laugh, then rolls her eyes at him, and when she feels another coughing fit coming on, she waves at him and hurriedly pulls the door shut behind herself.  
  
All things considered, that probably could’ve gone worse.  
  
===  
  
Her symptoms do get worse, then. She passes out in bed right after Guzmán leaves, only wakes up for the occasional coughing fit and some water during the night, and when she really wakes up the next morning, it’s somehow eleven already and she realizes she slept for almost fourteen hours.  
  
The fever is still her constant companion, but it spikes multiple times throughout the day now, and the pounding headache she’s had for the past week won’t go away at all anymore, which obviously leaves her feeling paranoid. What if that’s connected to oxygen levels — maybe the pain is caused by her body shutting down. Maybe she’s dying— maybe… Maybe she needs to calm the fuck down and stop watching the news.  
  
Worst of all, perhaps, is the coughing fits. They’re short, but every single time she swears she can feel her lungs threatening to explode like they can’t handle the simple task of breathing anymore.  
  
She spends most of her day asleep, barely even checks her phone at all because it hurts to look at the screen for too long, and when she does finally glance at it at the end of the day, there’s a couple of texts from Guzmán starting with a joking ‘ _are you alive_ ’ from this morning to a couple of random memes that obviously went ignored, only to finally cumulate in ‘ _if you don’t reply within the next hour I’m coming over_ ’. He sent that 47 minutes ago, so she sighs and dials his number, just to get him off her back.  
  
“So you’re not dead,” he says by way of greeting. She bites back a smile.  
  
“Don’t be so dramatic. I’m fine, I was asleep.”  
  
“You were asleep all day?” She hums, affirmative. “Then you’re not fine.”  
  
“Guzmán, I swear to god, I don’t need you to keep checking on me,” she says, frustrated with this general situation, but especially with the way she can feel her entire body going hot again. Can this fucking fever pass already?  
  
She hears him laugh, and under normal circumstances, she’d probably be in the mood for silly banter, but not now. “No, but you do need me to feed you.”  
  
Well, it’s not like she’s really eating a lot. Turns out not having any sense of taste or smell is a surprisingly easy way to ensure you’ll never crave food again. She’ll probably never recover from the emotional turmoil of biting into a piece of chocolate because she had a craving and then remembering that she won’t be able to taste it. It’s made her realize the texture of melted chocolate actually feels kind of gross and slimy on your tongue, and she’s not sure she’ll ever be able to eat it again — another thing to thank Covid for, maybe.  
  
But if she tells him she’s barely eating, he’ll freak out even further and she’s not in the mood for that. Any energy she’s got is better spent freaking out herself, going down a spiral of constantly overanalyzing her own symptoms and wondering if she’ll wake up from this next nap or if she’ll just die peacefully in her sleep. Is this what being sick is meant to be like? Are you supposed to feel incredibly emotional and dramatic and ready to just slit your own wrist to make it all stop? Jesus, maybe she’s been missing out all these years.  
  
Even if they aren’t close anymore, she knows Guzmán is overbearing and obnoxious enough to keep checking on her. He loves taking care of people, so she sighs, then says, “Look I’ll text you tomorrow so you know I’m alive.”  
  
“Okay,” he says, and then there’s an awkward pause before he adds, “And I want a key to your apartment,” like that’s a reasonable thing to ask for.  
  
She narrows her eyes. “Why?”  


“Well, _someone_ has to find your body and call the cops if you stop texting me one day,” he jokes, proud of himself for that comeback if the little laugh he snorts out is any indication.

She really doesn’t think that’s even remotely funny, honestly. Death feels imminent. The worse she feels, the harder it’s getting to keep the self-pity and her flair for the dramatic at bay. 

“I’ll text you tomorrow,” she bites out, then hangs up and busies herself with finding something to eat, just to get some energy back. 

===  
  
He never does end up getting that spare key. Two days after their little chat he’s at her door again with more supplies.  
  
It’s been a shitty few days, honestly. She hasn’t gotten any worse, but the continued stress of having to fight this fucking virus is wearing on her body. Even though she spends most of her day sleeping, she feels exhausted. And honestly? Constantly telling herself she doesn’t get to complain or feel bad for herself just because she isn’t on the brink of death is getting old.  
  
When she opens the door for Guzmán, she doesn’t even care about how completely terrible she must look. She hasn’t exactly had the energy to bother with trying to look her best — bothering with basic hygiene has been hard enough.  
  
This time he’s already a couple of steps away from the door, and he’s maskless today which is reckless and not something she appreciates, but she’s too tired to reprimand him and he’s definitely keeping a safe distance from her, so it’s probably fine.  
  
She’s just spent about an hour quietly sobbing into her pillow because she’s overwhelmed and exhausted and frustrated and she hasn’t bothered looking in a mirror to check just how obvious her deteriorating mental state might be to others. Judging by the genuine look of horror on his face, it’s probably pretty blatant.  
  
“Jesus Christ, Carla,” he says, then takes a small step towards her. She glances at the distance between them to remind him to stay back. He clears his throat. “My mom made you some soup.”  
  
That’s what finally gets her. He didn’t say anything revolutionary, but the fact that his mother made her soup? Well. She doesn’t _want_ to cry. She doesn’t want to be the stupid privileged girl who can’t even deal with having the fucking flu for a week without completely losing her marbles. Guzmán’s looking at her like he’s genuinely concerned, and then there are tears welling up in her eyes again, and she hears herself let out a quiet little sob.  
  
Did she mention he likes taking care of people? He’s across the hallway and right in front of her in seconds, and then he’s got his arms around her, holding her to his chest as she sobs into his simple cotton t-shirt. She doesn’t even realize he shouldn’t have done that until it’s too late, until she’s definitely rubbed her stupid germs all over him, and then she lets herself melt into his embrace, feeling embarrassingly content to just be touching another human again.  
  
“You really shouldn’t have done that,” she mumbles against his chest when she feels calm enough to speak.  
  
He tightens his arm around her waist, then pats her hair with his other hand and laughs. “It’s a good thing I brought enough food to last us a while.”  
  
She feels delirious from a combination of general emotional exhaustion and the way her entire body is still burning up with a fever, so she lets herself be happy about this development instead of reprimanding him for needlessly risking his health. It’s too late for that anyway.  
  
Pulling away, she opens the door further and tries to smile. “You might as well come in, then.”  
  
===  
  
“You’ve been sick for over a week and haven’t watched any TV? Carla, that’s literally the best part of being sick.”  
  
They’re eating soup which he expertly heated up for them. She’s on her back with her feet up in his lap on her couch, and it’s the middle of the day, so she feels a little better. Lunchtime is usually pretty alright in terms of Covid woes.   
  
She rolls her eyes. “I’ve been too busy _actually_ being sick to reap the rewards.”  
  
He looks over to roll his eyes at her, then goes back to scrolling Netflix for something to watch. This is… nice. It’s good to have company, at last.  
  
She hums around a spoonful of soup. She still can’t taste much but it’s all warm and soupy and comforting and… It’s just so _good_. Speaking of — she pokes his thigh with her foot and says, “There’s no way Laura made this.”  
  
Guzmán laughs. “Hey, are you insulting my mom’s abilities in the kitchen?”  
  
“Oh, I definitely am,” she sticks her tongue out at him when he tickles her feet. “I will never forget that sleepover at your house when the maid was sick and your mom overcooked the rice.”  
  
It was _awful_. She needed a full month to trust herself to eat rice again.  
  
Guzmán seems to be recalling that day, too, because he pulls a face and breaks into a fit of giggles. “It tasted like rice soup.”  
  
They’re both laughing, and this is definitely the most at ease she’s felt in weeks. Hell, in months, maybe. Years.  
  
“Have you told your mom you’re stuck here yet?”  
  
He nods. “I texted her.” He holds out his unlocked phone to her and lets her read Laura’s response. “Can you believe she’s more relieved about you not having to be alone than concerned about how her only son might catch Covid and _die_?”  
  
Carla grins at him. “She always did strike me as a smart woman.”  
  
When she checks her phone after her afternoon nap, she’s got a missed call from her mother, of all people. Of course.  
  
The loud groan of frustration she lets out is apparently alarming enough for him to walk into the room to check on her.  
  
“What’s up?”  
  
“Nothing,” she buries her face in her favorite pillow. “I forgot our moms talk.”  
  
She also forgot how little Guzmán knows about the fact that she and her mom _don’t_ talk; he chuckles and makes a silly joke about them wanting to be in-laws, and she forces a smile.  
  
She really isn’t in the right state of mind to clue him in.  
  
===  
  
She isn’t trying to make things weird, she promises. But she’s wanted to take a hot bath for the past week, and she didn’t trust herself to do it unsupervised and… Now she’s got someone to supervise. Even if that means she has to risk bringing it up.  
  
Amusement flashes across his face when she does. “You want me to watch you bathe?”  
  
And yeah, she’s pretty sure he’s checking her out a little, which is a concept that’s basically impossible for her to grasp. She hasn’t brushed her hair in a week. She’s wearing the plainest, loosest clothing she owns. Absolutely nothing about her appearance can possibly be appealing in any way.  
  
“You don’t have to _literally_ watch,” she says. “Just stay nearby and make sure I don’t fall asleep and drown.”  
  
He’s grinning at her. “Ok, got it. So you _do_ want me to watch.”  
  
She isn’t feeling her best, so she doesn’t flirt back the way she wants to.  
  
There’s nothing inherently sexual about taking a bath in from of someone else. In the end, he draws it for her, adds some eucalyptus oil to the water because he claims google told him that might help with her headache, and he dutifully turns around when she unties her robe and steps into the tub.  
  
He brings a chair over from the living room, positions it so he’s sitting with his back to her and she kind of has to laugh. It’s admirable, really, but he’s seen her naked before. There’s no need to be this cavalier about it.  
  
“Ow,” she screeches, just to fuck with him, then just sticks her head out of the water so she can smirk at him triumphantly when he instantly turns around. “Ha, made you look.”  
  
“Oh, real mature.”  
  
And the bath is nice of course, exactly the sort of warm and cozy experience she was hoping for but… She’s kind of thinking she might want to leverage this situation.  
  
“You should get in with me,” she tells him, and he’s still trying very, very hard to not break eye contact with her and look down. Just for fun, she sits up a little further and makes sure her chest is peaking out over the water.  
  
Guzmán takes a deep breath, then looks at her long and hard. “Let’s talk about that when you’re feeling better.”  
  
He’s smiling when he goes to turn around again, and it makes her feel warm all over.  
  
===  
  
“Didn’t you buy this place with Polo?”  
  
It’s a sunny day, so they’re out on the balcony enjoying some fresh air with breakfast. She doesn’t want to jinx it by saying it but she feels a tiny bit better today, like some of the brain fog has lifted.  
  
It’s rare to hear Guzmán mention Polo’s name, so she braces for his reaction when she nods. She sees his fist clench and unclench, but that’s all; she can barely even tell he’s fazed.“It’s nice,” he says. 

Maybe some teasing is in order.  
  
“Wow, no angry outburst? I expected more from you, Nunier.”  
  
“Yeah, well, it’s all about compartmentalizing the trauma and letting yourself revisit it step by step.”  
  
Carla smiles. She can’t be sure, of course, but she’d bet money he’s in therapy now. That sounds like something a therapist might suggest. Him getting professional help has probably been long overdue. There’s no way she’s gonna ask, though.  
  
Instead, she nudges his shoulder with her own and grins. “Oh my god, wait, are you an adult? You kind of sounded like an adult just now.”  
  
Guzmán scoffs, feigning offense. “Fuck you.”  
  
Oh, he’s making this way too easy for her.  
  
“I’m on the brink of death and all you can think about is sex… typical.”  
  
His arm around her shoulder slides down to her hip so he can pull her closer. She puts her head on his shoulder and doesn’t object when he ruffles her hair a little.  
  
===  
  
She makes it through all of Moneyball (it was his turn to pick a movie…) without falling asleep on him, even though the movie is dreadfully boring. When the credits are rolling, she’s hit with the sudden realization that she hasn’t had a headache all morning.  
  
There’s no way she’ll ever take not having a pounding headache at all times for granted again. She’s gonna be the most grateful fucking person the world has ever seen.  
  
He’s actually reading the credits, like the fucking dork he is, trying to figure out where he knows that one actor from, and she sits up and launches herself into his lap for a hug.  
  
The remote drops to the floor and his hands go out to steady her so she doesn’t fall off the couch, and they’re both laughing a little. She buries her face against his neck and grins.  
  
Carla really likes the way he gently pulls back to look at her when he says, “Feeling better?”  
  
She nods, then lets her head drop against his shoulder. “You smell like my shampoo.”  
  
He ends up carrying her to bed. She objects when he tries to force her to take a nap even though she isn’t even that tired, but arguing with him is futile, and she could probably use some sleep anyway.  
  
Grinning up at him, she reaches for his hand. “Read me a bedtime story?”  
  
He chuckles and calls her silly, but he also unlocks his phone and finds this NYT article he really liked and starts reading it to her.  
  
She definitely needs some more rest and an assortment of meds, but she thinks she needs this, too.  
  
==  
  
His mom comes by to drop off a bag of clothes for him and the three of them engage in a slightly awkward catch-up while keeping six feet of distance between them at all times. Laura is standing where Guzmán stood two days ago, and she’s barely spared her son a glance since Carla came over and joined their conversation.  
  
Carla has no idea what she’s done to deserve Laura’s genuine concern. She’s pretty sure she hasn’t even spoken to the woman since Marina’s wake almost three years ago.  
  
“Is he taking care of you? Keeping you fed?”  
  
Guzmán groans, rolling his eyes at his mom. “Of course I am.”  
  
“He’s great at microwaving soup.” She laughs, then puts an arm around Guzmán’s waist and motions to the outside world. “How’s life out there?”  
  
They chat for a little while longer, and just before Laura turns to leave, she hesitates, looks at Carla and says, “Your mother is really worried, maybe you should give her a call.”  
  
Laura probably has no idea why Carla isn’t answering her mom’s calls — she’s sure her mother has failed to mention the fact that they’ve fallen out to her. She can feel Guzmán’s eyes on her like the implication that she isn’t speaking to her parents at all is news to him, too.  
  
“Feel free to tell her I’m doing perfectly fine,” she says, a little too tired to bother with formalities.  
  
Laura looks like she wants to ask about that, but then she sees Guzmán shaking his head just slightly from the corner of her eye, and the older woman nods, smiles and turns to leave.  
  
This is nobody’s business but her own and she doesn’t owe anyone an explanation, but when Guzmán asks her about it gently as they’re having a late lunch, she tells him the truth anyway.  
  
===  
  
Before bed, she manages to take a full five-minute shower without feeling even remotely faint and immediately wonders if she’s finally got this fucking virus beat. She slips into slightly less hideous but equally comfortable sweatpants and a tank top and heads to bed.  
  
Guzmán is already there waiting for her, sitting with his head propped up against the headboard on his side of the bed. He’s reading something on his iPad, and she finds herself smiling at how domestic this all feels before she drifts off.  
  
The brief feeling of calm is short-lived. Later that night, she wakes up gasping for air, her forehead drenched in sweat, with absolutely no recollection of what the dream that led to this was about. All she remembers is a feeling of dread that made her heart feel like it was beating out of her chest. It still feels like that now.  
  
There are tears in her eyes, and she’s still breathing hard, even a few minutes after the unwanted wake-up call.  
  
Guzmán is fast asleep next to her, looking peaceful and clueless as he sleeps with his back to her and she really, really needs a hug right now. She isn’t thinking clearly, but even if she was she’s pretty sure she’d come to the same conclusion — she’s absolutely gonna use him as her own personal body pillow.  
  
Scooting closer, she spoons him from behind, making sure to squeeze him tight. She hears him grumble in his sleep, molding his body to hers, and when she wraps a hand around his forearm, he finally seems to be waking up. She didn’t need him to wake up, but that doesn’t mean she isn’t relieved when he lets out a sleepy groan as he turns onto his back. As soon as he’s done moving, she drapes herself over him and puts her head on his chest.  
  
“Everything okay?” 

Not really, no, but she doesn’t know how to explain what’s going on using actual words, and she’s still shaking a little, so she’s pretty sure he’ll get what’s going on no matter what she tells him. She shakes her head slowly, then sighs. “No.” 

He pulls her closer and keeps his hand on her lower back. His touch is so much better at improving her general health than any of the countless types of flu medicine she’s been on for the past week or so; maybe pharma companies should try to bottle this feeling of reassurance he exudes and sell that. 

“Just had a bad dream,” she says quietly.  
  
He hums, then turns so he’s on his side looking at her, and motions for her to cuddle closer. Being the little spoon is definitely way more comfortable — his broad chest is pushing against her back, and she instantly feels a little better.  
  
“Guzmán,” she whispers, then stops herself, a few minutes later when his breathing has evened out again. She feels his hand on her stomach move in small, soothing circles, so she knows he must be awake. “Do you ever think about us?”  
  
He yawns against her neck, then hums appreciatively and slides his foot up her calf. “All the time.”  
  
It makes her blush in the dark, to hear him admit it. God, she’s being so stupid. She’ll blame her general state of anxiety about absolutely everything on the horrible dream she just had. Well, and on coronavirus. Fuck coronavirus.  
  
She still can’t help but murmur, “Good,” before she cuddles closer to him and closes her eyes.  
  
===  
  
In the morning, he’s still wrapped around her and she struggles to think of a reason to get up.  
  
She’s sick and has no plans of attending online class, and even though she knows he’s studying something or other (Engineering?) at UPM, he hasn’t actually mentioned class at all. They have nowhere to be. It’s pretty great.  
  
Since she woke up before him, she gets to enjoy his embrace a tiny bit longer and then, to her genuine amusement, feels him slowly come to and try to move away from her without ‘waking her up’. The joke’s on him, because she’s definitely awake, and she’s not gonna let him awkwardly pull away. When he tries to slowly retract the arm he’s got slung over her waist, she reaches down and grabs his hand, then forces him to stay still and giggles. “Are you trying to sneak out on me?”  
  
He laughs, and she thinks it’s the deep sleepy grovel in his voice that makes him sound serious when he says, “Worked for you last time.”  
  
Ah, so they’re gonna finally acknowledge that happened, then. Okay. She can deal with that. She rolls her eyes, even though she’s got her back to him, then lightly elbows him in the ribcage. “I had a flight to catch!”  
  
“Whatever,” he says, which is vague enough for her to turn around so she can check if he’s being nonchalant or just _acting_ like he is. Looks like a mixture of both, maybe. “I’m gonna make breakfast. Do you want waffles or pancakes?”  
  
“Both,” she says, grinning at him, even though she doesn’t want either.  
  
They’re sharing a pillow, and she’s resisting the urge to lean over and kiss him. He’s just too close — if he’s gonna invade her personal space like this, he better be willing to kiss her. But she’s probably got awful morning breath, and he might be disgusted at the thought of having to kiss her while she’s oozing bacteria, even if he definitely has to have caught the virus by now, too.  
  
Guzmán closes the gap between them, pecks her cheek, and leaves the room.  
  
===  
  
Thursdays have been she and Lu’s standing FaceTime date night in lockdown times, and she’s totally forgotten that’s even a thing until it’s a little after 8pm and her phone rings right as she’s helping Guzmán cook dinner.  
  
She only picks up on the fifth ring, which she knows Lu hates, so she apologizes before the other girl has even said hi. When Lu spots Guzmán behind her, awkwardly waving at the camera as he’s cutting an onion, the brunette frowns.  
  
“Since when do you two hang out?”  
  
Guzmán takes a step towards her, then grins at the screen. “Well, she gave me Covid, so now I can’t leave.”  
  
He’s making it sound so intentional — like she literally purposefully gave it to him so he’d stick around — but she really isn’t that much of a mastermind.  
  
“Oh, grow up,” she tells him, rolling her eyes at him and turning to Lu. “How’s New York?”  
  
Lu is easy to distract if you just ask her about a vague enough topic — she spends the next five minutes telling her random anecdotes from the few times she’s been able to leave her apartment this week, and Carla uses that time to move to the living room and get her headphones out. When Lu spots them, she rolls her eyes. “Now that he’s out of earshot… Can’t you two just tell me you’re hooking up like normal people? What’s with the weird Covid flirting?”  
  
“He’s technically right. He hugged me, so his reward is getting to live here rent-free for fourteen days.”  
  
“Okay, but you fucked him.” Lockdown has only made Lu more jaded. She shouldn’t have expected any less from her. “You fucked him _recently_ , and you said you _liked_ it, and now you’re just gonna play house for two weeks? I call bullshit.”  
  
She can’t be sure Guzmán won’t be able to hear her from the kitchen, so she groans in response and flips Lu off.  
  
Lu says something nonchalant about some guy she’s seeing — despite strict stay at home orders, because no pandemic will tame Lu’s libido — and Carla makes sure to be crass when she teases her about it. Payback for that super uncalled for way she just called her out about Guzmán.  
  
“You know we’ve been talking for 30 minutes and you haven’t asked me how I’m doing once, right?” She grins, then full-on laughs when Lu snorts a little. “So fucking selfish. Here I am, facing inevitable death at the hands of Covid and my best friend—,” the screen goes black and the line cuts off.  
  
She calls her back right away, and when Lu’s video loads she’s just grinning at her. “Sorry, that just felt like a fun, dramatic thing to do.”  
  
No one does dramatic quite like Lu.  
  
===  
  
Over dinner, Guzmán laments about how he still hasn’t gotten sick, teases her about her shitty immune system and she kicks his shin under the table and sighs.  
  
“Shut up, asymptomatic little bitch,” she grins at him. “We don’t need your gloating around here.”  
  
He stabs a pea with his fork and flicks it at her, then calls her annoying and goes back to his food.  
  
===  
  
The worst part of being stuck inside with him while she’s sick is honestly that she can’t get drunk. Not in a scary, alcoholic, can’t-live-without-liquor sort of way but she’d appreciate a tiny bit of liquid courage. Not even for herself —she’s fine — he’s the one being awkward.  
  
She’s been feeling better every day. It’s been over a week since she first started showing symptoms, and she didn’t even wake up with a fever today, which has to count for something.  
  
Now it’s just after 10 pm, and when she puts her head in Guzmán’s lap like she has done for the past three nights of couch Netflix shenanigans, she feels him tense up. God, he is being such a baby about all of this.  
  
And because she’s still a little bit of a blunt asshole who never shies away from confrontation, she looks up at him and says, “Stop being this fucking weird about it.”  
  
Guzmán lets out a laugh and reaches for her arm, tugging her up so she’s sitting with her shoulder brushing his. He grabs her hand, which is good progress as far as having him avoid touching her, then looks over at her and she thinks this must be it. They’re gonna talk about it, or use their bodies to do it.  
  
“Do you want to…” He trails off, a grin on his face. _Yes_ , yes she wants to. “Watch another episode of Stranger Things?”  
  
She gives him the cute smile she knows for a fact he likes because he drunkenly admitted it to her during that night in February and nods.  


Maybe she’ll let him get away with this for now.  
  
===  
  
She falls asleep on him again, this time with her head on his shoulder on the couch, and when she wakes up he’s just playing with the strap of her tank top, his fingers brushing her collarbone. That feels nice, so she hums, then rolls her eyes a little when he instantly stops.  
  
“Let’s get you to bed,” he says, and she stretches her arms above her and nods. Bed sounds like a good idea.  
  
He doesn’t carry her this time, and she’s only a little sad about not being sick enough to warrant carrying anymore. He walks ahead, and when she looks up from her phone, he’s reaching for his shirt, this plain white cotton shirt he’s been wearing a lot, and she knows the look she gives him when he takes it off is way too dark. His eyes linger on hers, and there’s a little grin on his face like he’s enjoying the attention.  
  
She has no reason to get undressed because she’s only wearing a pair of sweats and a tank top to begin with, but she wants to make him feel as tempted as she’s feeling by the expanse of his chest that’s bared to her right now. She probably doesn’t need to wear pants to bed. She steps out of them, then laughs at the way he’s leering at her and throws them at him.  
  
He’s right behind her as she moves to the bathroom, and she’d like to think it’s because he’s checking out her ass. She knows it looks great in these simple black lace panties. While they’re brushing their teeth, she keeps glancing at him in the mirror, at the deep ridge between his stupid abs, and finally reaches over to run her hand from his chest to his stomach. It’s really unfair how he’s this buff when she hasn’t seen him do a single sit-up since he got here.  
  
That infuriating grin is back on his face after he rinses his mouth. She’s always loved his arrogance a little too much. She splashes some water on her face, takes her hair out of the messy bun it was in and runs her hands through it, then turns to stare at him the way he’s been staring at her for the past few seconds.  
  
He smiles at her, then leans over and grabs her wrist. “Come on, you need to get some rest.”  
  
Ugh. Why is he so fucking… like this? Can’t he drop the whole concerned friend act and just admit he wants to be touching her? She’s not gonna die if he kisses her. (She might die if he doesn’t.)  
  
To her surprise, he instantly moves closer to her in bed once they’re both horizontal. The way he’s spread out in the middle makes her think he wants her to throw an arm over his chest and draw her leg up across his hip, so she does. The room is dark around them, but she can tell he’s looking down at her right as she looks up at him and she’s had enough of this dancing around him shit. One of them needs to be an adult about this, and it’s gonna be her, even if he’s older than her.  
  
She grins at him, waits for him to laugh in acknowledgment and asks if she can kiss him. He doesn’t answer, just scoffs and tugs on her arm until she’s in his lap, and the second his lips are on hers she stops thinking about how they should’ve been doing this all along and focuses on making herself feel good instead.  
  
Kissing him always feels good. There’s just something about it that feels so different from kissing anyone else. She’s never been able to narrow that down, exactly. Not that she’s spent a lot of time kissing him — this is maybe the third time ever, if you don’t count prepubescent spin the bottle incidents.  
  
The thought of that, of how she’s wanted this for a few days and didn’t quite know how to ask for it, is enough to spark heat low in her belly. She needs him. And she’s been the bold one so far, but he turns that around on her when he flips her over, practically drags her top over her head and kisses her so aggressively, she’s struggling to breathe for reasons entirely unrelated to respiratory distress.  
  
This is only the second time they’ve done this, and yet she can’t help but marvel at how good they are at it. The way he instantly knew what she liked last time was hot, but now it feels intimate and familiar and somehow so much hotter than last time, too.  
  
He breaks away from her lips to ask, “Are you sure you’re okay?” and she lightly slaps his cheek in response. She’s more than okay. He reaches over to the nightstand to turn on the little night light she keeps there. It’s so he can see her, she realizes when he comes back to hover over her, his eyes scanning every inch of her body.  
  
“Are you gonna spend the rest of the night staring or are you actually gonna touch me?”  
  
He chuckles, then drags his knuckle along her hip bone, taps his fingers frustratingly close to where she wants him to touch her. “I can do both.”  
  
Then she’s fully naked under him, and she’s getting a little frustrated with how he’s teasing her with small little touches that are never quite enough. He’s still wearing his stupid Calvin Klein boxer briefs because he’s actually such a preppy boy cliché, and she says his name on a breath when he bites down on her collarbone.  
  
“Do something, god,” She sighs.  
  
That gets him to grin at her again, all cocky and challenging. “You don’t have to call me God, Guzmán is fine.”  
  
Such a fucking corny dad joke. He’s gonna drive his kids crazy one day. For now, he’s definitely driving _her_ crazy. She moves his hand between her legs and smirks at him. “Enough with the god complex. Get to work.”  
  
He doesn’t need to be told twice.  
  
===  
  
When he wakes her up in the middle of the night a week later by shaking her repeatedly, she squints at the bright screen of his phone in his hand and tries to squeeze her eyes shut to keep the light out.  
  
“I have a fever,” he whines, then points to the Covid symptoms listed on the website he’s got open. “This is the beginning of the end.”  
  
“Calm the fuck down, drama queen,” she says. Touching her hand to his forehead, she shrugs when it comes away feeling a little warmer than usual. “You’re fine.”  
  
“How would you know? You’re not a doctor.”  
  
She grins at him, then pushes the phone out of his hands and climbs on top of him. “I can be whatever you want me to be, hun.”  
  
He grabs her hip and pulls her close.   


===  
  
"Did you have to post the ugliest picture of me ever taken?"  
  
She's frowning at her phone. Guzmán posted a random, dimly lit shot of her asleep in his lap, her hair a complete mess, her cheeks slightly rosy and her face completely stripped of makeup to Instagram. Right; as if Lu isn't obnoxious enough about this whole developing _thing_ between them already.   
  
He shrugs at her from across the room and grins. "It's a great picture."  
  
She almost loses her nerve, then decides to say it anyway. "Jeez, love really _is_ blind."   
  
He's laughing, and then he's across the room next to her, messing up her hair a little further.   
  
"I don't know about love," he starts. "But I'm definitely not blind."

The fact that he says it while smirking makes her think he knows it’s total bullshit.

  
  
  


**Author's Note:**

> find me [on tumblr](http://cupcakeb.tumblr.com/)


End file.
